The Gates of Byzantium (Purge of Babylon, Book 2)

by Sam Sisavath

  Gunfire exploded around him, so much louder than before. Something small and hot fell on Josh’s head. It burned his scalp, but before he could get out a scream and swat at it, the spent bullet casing fell away and clattered to the boat floor next to him. Other casings were falling around him and on the crates, the click-clack sounds almost melodic.

  Josh struggled back up into a sitting position while Maddie and Bobby shot back at the beach. The boat was moving fast now, the speed of the outboard motor making Josh completely forget about the snail-like pace of the trolling motor. Despite the burden they were putting on it, the boat was moving smoothly, with Will driving in the center, keeping just low enough to not get his head shot off.

  By the time Blaine, Bobby, and Maddie stopped shooting in order to reload, the boat was almost a full 150 yards away from the beach. Far enough that when the men chasing them finally got the courage to stand up and shoot back, their bullets harmlessly sank into the water around them, the plop-plop-plop of bullets disappearing into the lake.

  “Look,” Maddie said, pointing toward the mouth of the inlet.

  A boat appeared out of the inlet, hitting the main lake at full speed. It immediately turned left, pointing in their direction. It slowed down real fast when Blaine, Maddie, and Bobby all unleashed a torrent of bullets in its direction. Josh saw men on the boat diving to the floor and the boat seemed to jerk off-target.

  There was a loud ping! and Josh jumped. One of the bullets fired from the ridgeline had actually hit the side of the boat, kept going, and almost put a hole in Josh’s right sneaker, missing only by a few inches. The bullet punched through the bottom of the boat and water sprang inside.

  But the bullet had surprised him, and Josh stood up without thinking, ignoring the electric pain in his left leg.

  Oh, there’s the pain.

  He looked down and saw a thin trickle of blood from the earlier gunshot. He was still marveling at how little blood there was when he heard one of those bees screaming right next to his ear. He looked up and saw one of the men on the ridgeline taking careful aim with a rifle. Josh couldn’t tell if it was an AK-47, but he did remember that AK-47s were notoriously bad for long-distance shooting. Or at least, that’s what he had once read on the Internet.

  Josh grinned at the man.

  Give it up. You’re not going to hit anything, dude.

  Behind him, he heard Will’s voice: “Josh, sit the fuck down!”

  Josh looked back at Will and smiled. “He’s too far away to hit anything,” he said, when he heard that loud, screaming bee coming back for another pass, but this time instead of zipping by harmlessly, the bee actually hit him in the side of the head.

  Josh stumbled across the boat, suddenly very light-headed. His legs didn’t seem to be doing what he was telling them (Stop, you idiots, stop!), which was annoying.

  He caught sight of Will, who for some reason looked like he was moving sideways, lunging at him from across the boat, his hand reaching out, screaming, “Josh!”

  Oh, shit.

  Josh reached out for Will’s hand—but missed it by inches.

  Then he was falling, falling, and there was water all around him and he knew he was in the lake.

  And he was sinking.

  Sinking…

  CHAPTER 34

  WILL

  Good news and bad news. The good news is, we got what we went back to the marina for. The bad news? I got the kid shot up and now he’s at the bottom of the lake.

  Of course, he didn’t say that when Lara and Sarah came out to greet them at the pier. It didn’t take Lara very long to notice Josh wasn’t in the boat with them, though, but he thought her face looked pale even before that.

  “What happened?” he asked.

  “Sienna shot Carly,” Lara said.

  “Is she okay?”

  “She lost a lot of blood. I won’t know for sure until tomorrow, and maybe not even then.”

  “Where’s Sienna now?”

  “Danny shot her.” She looked at the boat, at the faces that were climbing out, and looked back at him. “Where’s Josh?”

  “He got shot and fell into the water. I had to leave him behind.”

  “You left him behind?”

  He couldn’t tell if she sounded incredulous, angry, or confused. Maybe none of the above. Possibly all three. “I had to leave him behind,” Will said again.

  Lara looked at him blankly. He could tell she was still traumatized by what had happened with Carly and Sienna and wasn’t quite sure how to process what he had just told her about Josh.

  After a while, she nodded. “Let me tell Gaby.”

  Will nodded back. He felt relief and guilt, but mostly relief. He had lost men in combat before, but it wasn’t the same as losing the kid. Josh wasn’t a soldier, and Will hadn’t expected him to contribute much in a firefight. But he was a decent enough kid, and that counted for something when there were so few decent people still around these days.

  They transferred the crates from the boat to the pier, then carried them back to the hotel. Will and Blaine took the tools to one of the unfinished rooms in the back where there were plenty of walls without windows for ventilation. Maddie and Bobby followed inside with the crate of silver.

  Danny showed up later to shake hands with Blaine. “Good to see you back in one piece.”

  “Good to be in one piece,” Blaine said. “Mostly, anyway.”

  “Sorry about Sandra.”

  “Yeah,” Blaine said. “I hope Carly’s okay.”

  “She will be,” Danny said, with absolute certainty.

  “This is Maddie and Bobby. Bobby doesn’t speak.”

  “Yeah? I bet the girls go crazy for that,” Danny said.

  Bobby grinned sheepishly back at him.

  “Don’t worry, I make up for his lack of speaking,” Maddie said.

  “Welcome to Song Island,” Danny said. “Unlike the previous landlords, we’re not going to feed you to the ghouls.”

  Maddie, Blaine, and Bobby exchanged a confused look.

  Blaine looked over at Will. “Wanna fill us in? There seems to be an awful lot of shooting around this place. I didn’t quite expect that.”

  “I know you thought you came here to get away from the fighting,” Will said, “but it’s more complicated than that.”

  “How complicated?” Maddie asked.

  *

  Will and Danny gave them a brief, half-assed tour of the island, filling them in on Karen, Tom, and Marcus along the way. They told them about the previous night, about the ghouls, and ended the tour at the power station, where they stood in front of the concrete wall they had built over the door of the shack.

  “Are you serious?” Blaine said. “They’re in there right now?”

  “Yeah,” Will nodded.

  “How many?” Maddie asked.

  “A few hundred,” Danny said. “Give or take. If by ‘take’ you mean possibly lots of hundreds. Or thousands.”

  “The only way to tell is to go in there,” Will said.

  “We’re taking volunteers,” Danny added.

  “Where do they come from?” Maddie asked.

  “We think there’s a tunnel under there,” Will said. “We don’t know where it goes, or how far it runs under the lake. Eventually, we’ll have to figure it out, but that’s for later.”

  “But the island is safe, though? They can’t swim over?”

  “We don’t think so. As far as we know, this tunnel seems to be their only access to the island.”

  “As far as you know?” Blaine said doubtfully.

  “We can’t be sure,” Will said. “But as far as we know, yeah.”

  “So they’re stuck in there?” Maddie asked, exchanging a private look with Bobby.

  “That’s the going assumption,” Will said.

  “And you know what happens when you assume,” Danny said.

  “They’ve been down there all day?” Blaine asked.

  “Since last night, yeah,” Wil
l nodded.

  “Jesus Christ.”

  Danny chuckled. “Get to the island, it’ll be safe. No more ghouls to worry about. Except for the few thousand already waiting underneath it. Hey, it beats running around out there, right?”

  Blaine, Maddie, and Bobby exchanged a look that said they weren’t entirely sure about that anymore.

  “It’s not too late,” Will said. “They want the island, but you don’t have to be here when they try to take it. If you decide to leave before they come back, we’ll give you everything you can carry—food, ammo, weapons, and supplies—and we’ll give you a boat and help you get back on land, avoid the people at the house. There are other places to dock that don’t involve the marina, and we’ll do everything we can to help you move on. No hard feelings.”

  They listened quietly, not saying a word. He could see their minds reeling, then gathering, then trying to sift through the pros and cons.

  “But if you want to stay here,” he continued, “you’ll have to fight for the privilege. That may sound like a shitty deal, but it’s all I have to give you at the moment.”

  Maddie and Bobby exchanged another private look that didn’t involve Blaine.

  Then Maddie said, “One question.”

  “Shoot,” Will said.

  “Who the hell are those guys at the house?”

  “Ghoul collaborators,” Danny said. “Assholes working with the creatures in exchange for their hides. Like Song Island’s previous tenants.”

  The three of them exchanged another series of quick looks, and he wondered if they believed Danny. The concept of collaborators, human survivors throwing in their lot with the ghouls, was a hard pill to swallow. He might not have believed it himself if he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes twice now.

  Blaine said to Maddie and Bobby, “If you guys want to go, I’ll go with you.”

  “You were the one who wanted to come here,” Maddie said. There was no accusation in her voice, it was just a statement of fact. She even sounded a bit confused by his offer.

  “I know, but Sandra’s death changed things for me. My priorities have changed.” He seemed to struggle with his thoughts. “Let’s face it, it’s no better out there. Hell, it’s probably worse. Here, at least, there’s a chance at something approaching a normal life for you and Bobby. So we’ll have to fight for it. So what else is new?”

  Maddie glanced over at Bobby again. The mute boy nodded and gave her the “OK” sign with his fingers.

  “Why the hell not,” Maddie said. She looked over at Will. “So, silver bullets?”

  *

  So they made silver bullets.

  A lot of them.

  Maddie and Bobby proved to be good workers. Neither one had made bullets before, but Maddie knew her way around a rubber mallet, and Bobby took instructions easily. Blaine wanted to help, but Will sent him to Lara to see to his wounds instead. The gunfight at the marina hadn’t done Blaine any favors, even if he insisted otherwise.

  Will also decided Danny should go back to the Tower to keep overwatch with the ACOG.

  “You think they’ll hit us back this quickly?” Danny asked.

  “I would,” Will said. “They lost a few people back there.”

  “Man, you’re just going around the end of the world making friends, aren’t you?”

  After Danny left, Sarah and the girls chipped in, bringing more silver from around the island, even raiding the kitchen and closets and racing through all the rooms.

  They didn’t stop until they had melted all the silver and pounded out as many 5.56x45mm and 9mm bullets and as much buckshot as possible. There was enough ammo from the Tower’s basement, collected over months from all the poor souls lured to the island before them, that they ran out of silver long before they ran out of bullets to recast.

  At one point, Maddie said, “If I knew I’d be working this hard, I would have stayed behind in Beaumont.”

  Bobby, drenched in sweat next to her, grunted his agreement.

  The acrid fumes of smelting metal, iron, and brass, mixed with silver, lingered over the island long after they were done. Will didn’t let them stop until they were literally walking around in puddles of their own perspiration.

  “Load up with what you can carry,” he told them. “Silver and regular ammo. The rest goes into the Tower.”

  “And these will actually work?” Maddie said, holding up one of the silver bullets.

  “They work,” Will said. “Shotguns for close quarters. You’ll need to keep all three types of ammo with you at all times. There are two more Benellis in the Tower. When in doubt, load the silver. They’ll kill a man just as easily as a ghoul.”

  Bobby tapped Maddie’s shoulder excitedly and nodded at Will.

  “He wants to know if you have any more assault vests,” Maddie translated.

  *

  Before six in the evening, he took away the M4s that Maddie, Bobby, and Blaine had arrived with and gave them new ones from the Tower’s basement. The new M4s had fully automatic capabilities, which would come in handy in a frenzied firefight. Amazingly, the more they searched the Tower’s basement, the more useful things they found, including assault vests and more radios.

  Later, they ate in the lobby, loading up on calories and proteins from fish and MREs. Blaine had rejoined them, looking better. Or at least, not walking with nearly the same noticeable limp as earlier. Bobby took to the MREs, and that got a chuckle out of Will and Danny, who had never really seen anyone who wasn’t ex-military take a liking to the bagged food the U.S. military was known for. The MREs were designed for maximum efficiency, supplying nutrients and over a thousand calories per bag. The taste, on the other hand, left a lot to be desired.

  Afterward, he got them set up along the beach, where he expected to need them to repel the coming attack on the island. If they were lucky, the people at the house would wait for tomorrow, and all of the preparation would be a waste of time.

  If they were lucky.

  Yeah, right.

  Lara was waiting for him on the hotel patio, arms folded across her chest as if she was cold. “You really think they’re going to attack?”

  “I would.”

  “But they’ve already lost too many men. Why would they attack again so soon?”

  “Who says that’s all they have? There could be more coming.”

  She frowned. “That’s a terrible thought.”

  “Hope for the best, prepare for the worst. Isn’t that our motto?”

  She gave him a wry smile. “You’ll have to fight with Carly about that. She likes the ‘Adapt or Perish’ one better.”

  “How’s she doing?”

  “She’s stable. That’s the good news.”

  “The bad news?”

  “She lost a lot of blood, Will.”

  Will nodded. He put his arms around her, and she sighed into his chest. “She’ll be fine,” Will whispered. “She’s a tough kid. Remember before The Purge? It was just Carly and her sister, and she got through it. She’s a fighter.”

  “I know,” Lara whispered back, though he wasn’t sure if she actually believed it.

  *

  Will walked with Lara back to the Tower. Carly had been moved to the second floor and was lying unconscious on a bed Danny had brought over from the hotel. They had dumped Tom’s old cot and most of Tom’s stuff out the window. Lara had set up an IV drip, and there were fresh flowers in vases. The place reminded him of a patient recovery room, minus the suffocating, cold, and sterile feel of a hospital.

  Carly looked like she was in a deep slumber, which wasn’t far from the truth. Lara had given her enough sedatives that he wondered if even an attack on the island would wake her up. Probably not. He had seen wounded soldiers sleeping through firefights before.

  “How’s Vera taking it?” Will asked.

  “She’s worried. She wouldn’t leave Carly’s side after it happened. Danny and I had to practically drag her out. Elise is taking care of her.”

&nbs
p; “Elise?”

  “Yes, Elise.” Lara smiled. “They’re more than sisters now, you know. They pick each other up when the other is down. It’s amazing how fast kids adapt.”

  Will looked out the window. He could see the marina and the house from here. Well, silhouettes of the buildings, anyway. It was quiet, and he couldn’t detect any activity across the lake.

  He stuck his head out of the window and looked up, and wondered if Gaby was up there looking at the marina, too.

  When he pulled his head back in, Lara was watching him. “You should go up there. I talked to her, but it’s not the same. I think she needs to hear it from you.”

  He nodded reluctantly.

  *

  Gaby was at the south window, looking at the shoreline with binoculars. She stood very quietly, almost relaxed, when he opened the third-floor door and climbed up. She looked over and smiled a bit, though he could tell she had been crying, and her eyes were still slightly red.

  He understood why Josh had been so head-over-heels about her. Gaby was a pretty girl. In a lot of ways, she reminded him a bit of Lara. A younger, taller Lara. In a few more years, she would have men tripping over themselves to get her attention. Not that they wouldn’t be tripping over themselves already, given the option.

  “Anything?” he asked.

  “Nothing yet.” She walked back to the east window and peered out at the house and marina.

  He walked over and stood silently next to her.

  Say something, you idiot.

  “They kept a boat outside the mouth of the inlet for a few hours after the shoot-out,” she said, “but then they pulled it back and I haven’t seen them move again since.”

  Her voice sounded normal, but what did he know? He was never that good at reading women. Even worse at comforting them.

  “I’m sorry about Josh,” he said.

  She didn’t say anything for the longest time, or seem to react at all, and Will wondered if she had actually heard him.

  After a few excruciating seconds that felt more like minutes (or hours), she said, “I know you did your best to save him. I don’t blame you, if that’s what you’re worried about.”